Exploring Musical Time: Carnatic & Jazz Collaboration
This flashback video is the culminating event of Brhaddhvani's 14th anniversary celebrations as the 'Lalgudi Year (2003-04)'. An inter-cultural world vision for improvisation, 'gathering the beads of musical time for a tool-kit to share on a world stage'. An educational collaboration among 'New School-New York', 'Newpark Music Centre, Dublin' and 'Brhaddhvani, Research and Training Centre for Musics of the World, Chennai' through the joint efforts of Martin Mueller, Ronan Guilefoyle and Karaikudi S. Subramanian.
This composition is called 'Nirnaya', in Khanda Nadai Adi tala, in the raga Revati, composed by Karaikudi S. Subramanian to collaborate with a Swiss Theoretical physicist who was also a piano player and a fellow Copeland Fellow at Amherherst College in 1985.
"As a uniquely intercultural music, jazz has been shaped by its joint African and European patrimony, as well as a host of local and distant musical "others." Among these, Indian classical musics play a special role: an awareness of Indian music is part of the contemporary jazz consciousness, and jazz musicians have frequently looked to Indian classical music as a source of both musical and extra-musical inspiration. Karnatic music - long marginalized in India and abroad - is emerging in the twenty-first century as a site of specific aesthetic and pedagogical interest in jazz" - Tanya Kalmanovitch (https://www.jstor.org/stable/41700010)
"In 1975, as my sister Rajeswari Padmanabhan, the mrdangam player Tanjore Upendran, and I touched down in Amsterdam, our journey to Berlin for a performance at the Museum für Völkerkunde began. With us, we carried veenas snugly nestled in light weighted bamboo baskets specially designed for the occasion. Upon arrival, a curious customs officer greeted us, eyeing the peculiar containers with a quizzical smile. His jest was one of stereotypical imagery, as he jokingly inquired if the baskets concealed any slithery companions within. Knowing all too well the association of India and bamboo baskets with snake charmers, I couldn't help but respond with a playful yet pointed remark, "You need to be careful, Sir," hinting at the careful handling required, both literal and figurative, should he dare to peek inside. Surprised by the revelation of musical instruments, he mistook our veenas for sitars, expressing familiarity with the legendary Ravi Shankar. Such an exchange, so casual and informed, seems almost surreal in today's world, where cultural nuances often go unnoticed.
Reflecting on cultural exchanges, I'm reminded of the remarkable journey of jazz across continents. It's said that Louis Armstrong, the iconic figure of jazz, introduced the genre to India when he landed in Mumbai (1930). Fast forward to a serendipitous encounter years later, Woody Louis Armstrong Shaw III, the son of Woody Shaw Jr., found himself among the students of the renowned New School for Jazz and Contemporary Music, immersed in the intricacies of improvisation at Brhaddhvani. The convergence of these musical legacies, spanning generations and continents, is a testament to the universality of music and its power to bridge cultural divides." - Karaikudi S. Subramanian